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We at Homes & Land have a lot to be thankful for – the best real estate agents in the business are working with us! We know how hard you work every day to make homebuyers and sellers’ dreams a reality, so please know that you are appreciated for everything that you do.

Below is a funny, light-hearted look at the First Thanksgiving story and how marketing could have made it all happen.
Happy Thanksgiving!

————————–How Advertising Saved Thanksgivingby Rob Wicker

As the Thanksgiving Story is traditionally told, the Pilgrims in Massachusetts would have starved to death except for the help of the Native-Americans. The Pilgrims were so grateful that they invited the Native-Americans over for a big spread. The Pilgrims planned to have turkey, dressing, squash casserole, yams, cranberry sauce, and pumpkin pie with Cool Whip. What is interesting, however, is that the Native-Americans initially didn’t want to have lunch with the Pilgrims.

Why not, you ask yourself? Well the Native-Americans had watched the Pilgrims stumble around for at least a year. They considered the Pilgrims to be a bunch of knuckleheads. For one thing, there were those clothes. The Pilgrims wore large, steeple-top hats that bumped against tree branches in the woods. Baggy black garments with gaudy white trim. And worst of all, funny square-toed shoes with silver buckles that got caught in the underbrush when the Pilgrims foraged for food.

In addition, the Pilgrims carried a rifle called a Blunderbuss. Who carries a loaded weapon named “blunder”?

Finally, the Pilgrims weren’t exactly tops in the Fun Department. Have you seen the pictures? The only thing rarer than a smiling Pilgrim is a laughing Pilgrim. There’s no “Pilgrim Section” in books about American humor. The Pilgrims were a bunch of stiffs.

In fact, that’s why the Pilgrims really wanted the Native-Americans to come to lunch. They were sick of each other! Think about it, the long boat trip on the Mayflower, nearly starving to death in the New World, nothing to talk about except how hungry they were—and no jokes. The Pilgrims were about ready to point those Blunderbusses at each other. They needed some company.

But the Native-Americans weren’t having any of it. They politely declined the Pilgrims’ invitation. They told the Pilgrims that they’d be out of town, visiting relatives on Cape Cod.

This is when the Pilgrims got clever. Sketching is one thing the Pilgrims were good at. It’s how they passed the time crossing the Atlantic. The Pilgrims sketched and colored fat roasted turkeys with all of the trimmings, squash casseroles, and cranberries not from the can. The drawings are so good that Butterball still uses some of them in their ads. The Pilgrims also showed the Native-Americans pictures of at least fifteen desserts, all with Cool Whip. Legend has it that one of the drawings even included a Pilgrim woman exposing a little ankle below her black dress.

The Pilgrims were basically advertising Thanksgiving! Boy, did they get a response. After seeing these drawings, the Native-Americans announced that their Cape Cod relatives had suddenly come down with whooping cough. The Native-Americans would be in Plymouth that Thursday, and they’d be delighted to come for lunch.

Advertisers have more options than ever. Yet magazines continue to be used by major marketers, including technology giants like Google, Facebook, and especially Apple.

Why? Because magazine advertising works.

Magazine readership is up among all age groups, and readers spend an average of 43 minutes per issue. Consumers report that magazines deliver “pure pleasure, control, and escape.”

And magazines hold your attention. Magazine readers are the least likely of all media users to engage in other activities. (Consider all the things you try to do when you’re watching television.)

Marketers have a word for this type of engagement: “Sticky.” It means that a medium captures the consumer’s attention for a long time. Stickiness is one of the reasons magazines work so well for advertisers.

Need proof? Give a copy of Homes & Land magazine to a friend or family member and watch what happens.

I recently attended the Xplode Conference in Destin, Florida. There was an interesting presentation by Eric Stegemann from the Tribus Group.

Attendees at Xplode were asked to submit their websites for a free critique. The only catch was that the critique was done in public as an educational exercise.

These are some of the suggestions made by Stegemann:

Your contact information should be prominently displayed at the right-hand top of the page because this is the most viewed spot on a website.

The website under review featured rolling waves and a beach built in Flash. Stegeman made the point that because a lot of people use IPhones and IPads, Flash is probably not a good choice since neither device is Flash-friendly.

People come to your site for four things: a. to see properties b. to find out how the market is doing c. to find out how much their home is worth d. for local information such as schools, shopping, culture, etc.

Because most people are looking for a home, make sure the SEARCH box is prominently displayed near the top of the page.

Keep in mind that a visitor to your site should not have to think about where to find something or what to do next. Everything on the site is easily identified and intuitive.

If you’re wondering about the design of your own site, Tribus offers a free website analysis. Just go to tribusgroup.com and click Shredder, then fill out the drop-down box. The company also offers a variety of other real estate related services.

Do you have trouble overcoming objections? Or maybe you just give up as soon as you hear an objection. If so, you need a system that’s easy for you to remember and use. Real estate trainer Dirk Zeller offers these six steps to overcoming objections.